The story told of a girl whose mother passed away when she was young. Her father was all she had left of her family, but he was never home. She had been alone for as long as she could remember.
One day, she decided she wanted to see her father, yearning for the company of the last member of her family. Secretly, she went to find him, only to be met with coldness.
“Why did you come here?” he asked, his voice echoing like thunder.
She found herself on the verge of tears. “I-I…”
“Do not come here again.”
Used to his frigid indifference, she didn’t expect him to welcome her with open arms, but his reaction still cut into her sharply. The memory remained with her like a deep scar.
The impression it gave her was clear: her father didn’t love her.
Nursing a wounded heart, the years passed and she grew older. Eventually, she made her debut in high society. Her grand debutante ball was held regardless of her father’s absence.
“He didn’t come today, either,” she despaired, leaving the banquet hall in misery. “Was it because he’s ashamed of me?”
As she sobbed to herself, a man appeared before her.
“Why are you crying, my lady?” he asked. His words were warm and his gaze was attentive. Although it was a simple kindness that, in his eyes, he could have afforded anyone, it meant the world to the girl. She had been starved of intimacy for years, so he felt like her savior.
After that fateful meeting, she began to trail after him like a shadow, begging for his attention until she eventually succeeded in becoming his lover. “I’ll give you anything you want,” she had told him. “All you have to do is love me.”
Unfortunately, reality strayed far from her wishes. Three years after the start of their new relationship, he came to her with a confession.
“I don’t need your love anymore. Truth be told, I’ve fallen in love with the princess,” he said. Then, he bid her his goodbyes.
Her only dream had been to marry him, and the breakup left her devastated.
“Even you have abandoned me…” she mourned. “I will never forgive you.”
Time soon passed. Suddenly, the very same princess who had stolen her lover fell ill, immediately collapsing into a coma. The cup she had drank from had been poisoned. Many people had witnessed the sight and had seen who had given the princess the accursed drink.
“You! Did you try to hurt her?” they accused the girl.
By now, she had blossomed into a woman. Although she had hated the princess for robbing her of her love, the woman had never wanted to hurt her. She had simply handed the princess a cup because she had asked for a drink to quench her thirst.
In response, the woman frantically shook her head. “No, it wasn’t me!”
No one believed her. The circumstances surrounding the incident and her unusual conduct marked her as the culprit in their eyes.
When this became indisputable, the emperor roared in anger. “Imprison that girl underground!” he commanded. “Now!”
However, no one immediately moved to execute his order. Standing behind the woman was a figure that was even more fearful than the emperor himself. Her father, Duke Floyen.
Although he had always been indifferent toward her, they were still family, so she latched onto his hand as tears rolled down her cheeks. Despite his advanced age, he still looked like a young man.
“Father, I really didn’t do it!” she pleaded, but he brushed her off.
“I will personally arrest her,” he said. He looked straight at the emperor as he spoke, his gaze steady.
Her eyes widened in astonishment.
The emperor, still wary of the unblemished man before him, sighed. “How can I trust you? I know you’re just going to cause trouble!”
Duke Floyen tried to appease his sovereign’s anger. “You will have no choice but to trust me if I lock her within the Room of Shadows,” he proposed.
The Room of Shadows was a prison cell devised to confine the empire’s most unforgiveable sinners. Neither weapons nor magic could break through it, making it notorious for being inescapable. Only immediate members of the royal family could freely open and close its doors.
By stating as such, the duke was essentially proclaiming he would abandon his daughter.
How could he do this to her? Wrought with despair, the woman was soon led into the underground dungeon by her cold-hearted father.
There, a fishy smell pervaded the chilled, musty air. Entering the prison for the first time in her life was terrifying, but what had frightened her the most was the Room of Shadows, which sat shrouded in darkness.
Before entering her cell, she decided to try her luck one more time. She called out in distress. “Father, I really—”
“Go in,” he said icily, cutting her off. An indescribable shock of pain ran through her, coaxing another flood of tears to splatter onto the ground.
She was really being abandoned, wasn’t she?
At that moment, her father reached into his coat. Furtively, he handed her something before finally pushing her into the cell.
“Endure.”
When the door closed behind her, blocking away his stony voice, a bright light emerged upon its surface. The light formed a circle etched with geometric patterns. It was an enchantment. A powerful one meant to seal the entrance.
The woman confirmed what her father had given her, and the knowledge seized her with misery and desperation. It was a dagger.
Why did he give this to her, she wondered? Did he want her to kill herself?
As the cold air inside the cell began to settle into her skin, so did the reality of his abandonment. She clutched the dagger tightly and cried silently.
Sometime later, a stranger approached the woman. As the prince, a direct descendant of the royal family, he could freely enter her cell. “I came to interrogate the sinner who had harmed my sister,” he told the guards outside. “Get out of my way.”
By then, her frustration and despair had left her fatigued.
The prince was dressed in black armor and was renowned for being a bloodthirsty war monger. Although he had a bad relationship with his half-sister, the princess, it was unlikely that he was here to save the woman. He probably wanted to torture her, as he was known by the people to enjoy the act.
His presence scared her even more. As she shook in fear, the guards responded to him cautiously. “W-We apologize, Y-Your Highness, but the emperor, His Majesty, has not yet approved of interrogations.”
He laughed, abrupt and harsh. The sound was so terrifying that the guards themselves began to tremble. “Why? Do you think I’ll kill her?” he asked.
The question was met with a brief silence. Wordless affirmation.
Eventually, the prince broke it. “Should I chop your heads off before I interrogate her first?” The guards pursed their lips and he laughed once more. “The prisoner will only tell the truth if she suffers pain harsh enough to bring her to the brink of death.” He turned to the woman. “But, don’t worry. I won’t kill you, at least.”
He sounded so calm despite the cruelty that left his lips, and it heightened the woman’s fears.
Was he going to torture her until she died? It was rumored that the prince had not only slaughtered numerous enemy soldiers at the border, but he had also killed many of their retainers. He was truly insane. A tyrant in the making.
Having such a man interrogate her frightened her. Death might’ve been more preferable than having to endure a moment at the hands of a man like him.
Her rationality began to fade, paralyzed by frustration and fear. Her last encounter with her father came to mind. She wanted to be reassured, but he had handed her a dagger instead.
It’s good that this happened, actually, she mused to herself. Because… someone like me…
All the insults she had endured up until now crossed her mind. She was the disgrace of Duke Floyen, the good-for-nothing that everyone strove to avoid. Raising the dagger, she laughed hollowly.
It’d be better if I just disappeared.
The prince caught on to her strange behavior and hurriedly reached out. “Stop!” he cried, but it was too late. She had already plunged the dagger into her chest.
Just like that, the woman had taken her own life. That was as far as the story went. The web novel stopped updating at that point.
I sighed with frustration. It would’ve been nice if there was an actual ending to the story. After all, the real culprit had never been uncovered.
“Jubelian,” a man called.
Ah, yes. ‘Jubelian Eloy Floyen’ was the full name of that woman. She was the villainess of the novel. As unadaptable as she was, she had always frustrated me when I read about her.
The man continued without a hint of remorse, sounding shamelessly annoyed. “Why did you call me here?”
God, I can’t believe that was the only thing he had to say after making me wait for three hours. I scolded him likewise, revealing my thoughts as such. “You’re three hours late, I see.”
His face reddened with embarrassment before cooling back down. “Jubelian,” he said once more, this time in warning. His voice had dropped a bit lower.
A natural reaction, I suppose. In his eyes, this might’ve been the first time she had ever spoken against him like this.
“Did I say something wrong?” I asked.
I was once just a reader of the novel, yet somehow… I had become the villainess. I became Jubelian, who had died after being abandoned by everyone she had ever loved.